The present invention is directed towards a packaged food article for the microwave cooking of an individual or small portion of an uncooked farinaceous foam to provide a finished expanded dessert product such as for a dessert, e.g., a cake, muffin, or brownie. The present products are individual convenience snack or dessert items.
Of course, any number of dessert food items can be reheated in a microwave oven. For example, if desired, a previously baked slice of a cake, or a baked muffin, or baked brownie piece can be warmed by microwave heating. Moreover, any number of packaged pre-cooked consumer food products can be or are specifically adapted to reheating prior to consumption. For example, a number of sandwich or hotdog-and-bun products are packaged in flexible film packaging that are intended to be distributed under refrigeration temperatures and microwave heated immediately prior to consumption. However, in the present invention, the microwave heating step importantly performs a cooking step involving dehydration and denaturation or coagulation of protein components. Thus, the present unfinished or uncooked products are to be distinguished from such prior art products that are already finished or substantially completely cooked. The present methods involving microwave cooking are also to be distinguished from mere microwave reheating or refreshing.
Recently, convenience packaged food products have been introduced in the United States for the microwave cooking of an individually sized portion of an expanded dessert under the Warm Delights trademark. The products are in the form of a kit comprising a first chemically leavened dessert dry mix packet or pouch (75 g); a second pouch (18 g) of topping to be applied before or after cooking; a plastic bowl; and, microwave preparation instructions. The consumer is instructed to open the dry mix packet and pour the dry mix into the bowl. The consumer is then asked to admix a small quantity, e.g., 4 teaspoons (20 mL) of water to the dry mix to form a batter in the bowl. The product is then cooked (rather than being merely reheated) by microwave heating for about 75 seconds. For brownie products, a topping can be applied to the finished baked product to form a freshly made microwave heated dessert. For cake products, the topping can be applied before the microwave cooking step. (See, for example, U.S. Ser. No. 60/649,251 “Container To Facilitate Microwave Cooking And Handling” (filed Feb. 2, 2005 by Kreisman et al.). The microwave heating step activates the chemical leavening system to provide an expanded finished dessert good. Even when such finished goods are prepared by microwave heating, such finished cooked goods are still colloquially referred to as “baked goods”.
While useful, the present invention provides improvements over the Warm Delights™ dessert kit arrangement. In one respect, the present invention provides a shelf stable, ready-to-cook, dimensionally stable, expandable, farinaceous un-gelatinized bakeable foam already present in the cup with optional topping for even greater preparation convenience. It will be appreciated that even greater convenience is provided to the consumer by eliminating several preparation steps required by existing commercial products, while providing a pleasing final baked texture and flavor. These steps include, inter alia: unpacking of the kit, opening of the dry mix packet, adding the dry mix to the bowl, disposing of the emptied dry mix packet packaging, measuring liquids for addition to the dry mix, mixing of the added liquids to the dry mix with a utensil, and cleaning of the mixing utensil. With current products, all of these steps must be performed prior to the microwave heating step.
One principle problem with providing such an article resides in providing a bakeable food composition for preparing an expanded finished dessert product that is shelf stable at room temperate for extended storage yet nonetheless can be baked by microwave heating to provide an expanded finished dessert good. The starting composition must contain sufficient moisture to provide a finished baked good with good eating qualities. Nonetheless, the starting composition must be shelf stable at room temperatures for considerable storage times without biological or other instability. The starting composition must be expandable to provide an expanded finished dessert good yet not contain any chemical leavening system that reacts with its moisture over its storage life. The presence of chemical leaveners negatively impacts shelf-stability due to the reaction of sodium bicarbonate with leavening acid during storage resulting in the release of carbon dioxide into the package headspace and the associated bulging of the package lid increase. A reduced pH of the batter improves stability by controlling many chemical and enzymic reactions and microbial growth.
In another aspect, the present articles are smaller in portion size. Current consumer food trends favor items that are portion controlled to provide about 100 calories per finished item.
However, providing shelf stable packaged food bakeable foam items of such controlled portion sizes presents unexpected technical challenges. The combination of a microwave absorptive food charge such as a dessert bakeable foam combined with small portions presents a difficult product tolerance challenge by microwave heating preparation. The difference between insufficient microwave heating (with undesirable unset bakeable foam) and excessive (resulting in a dry or even burnt finished product) can be quite small, e.g. 5-10 seconds. Variations in the power output of various consumer microwave ovens, whether the particular unit is equipped with a carousel, and even placement within the microwave heating cavity can exacerbate the problem of providing sufficient product preparation tolerance. As a result, it is believed that no consumer packaged food product is both small in quantity (to provide 100 calories or less) and intended for microwave cooking preparation.
The present novel foam compositions are to be understood as being fundamentally different in physical form from dessert compositions of the prior art. In the past, shelf stable products were provided in the form of dry mixes having heat activated chemical leavening systems to which the consumer added liquids to form batters. Often, the consumer would mix the dry components with home-supplied liquids, to provide aerated batters whose aeration augmented the expansion principally provided upon baking by the leavening system. The product offering of chemically leavened microwaveable desserts was more convenient than scratch baking, but still required the consumer to hydrate the batter, and clean up the mess of preparation of the batter. The resulting baked product attributes were not preferable compared to their oven-baked counterparts, but were reasonably acceptable for the improvement in convenience.
In other prior art teachings, ready-to-bake batters or doughs having a thicker consistency disposed within suitable packaging have been disclosed (See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,759,070 “Inert-Gas Based Leavened Dough System” issued Jul. 6, 2004 to Venky Narayanaswamy, et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,178,893 “Product And Process Of Making A Room Temperature Storage Stable Dough” issued Jan. 12. 1993 To Gila Seewi et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 6,039,994 “Ready-To-Bake Shelf-Stable Cake Dough And Process For Its Manufacture” issued Mar. 21, 2000 To LeFlecher et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 6,224,924 “Shelf Stable Batter Article And Method Of Preparation” issued May 1, 2001 to Narayanaswamy et al.; US 2007/0042099 “Ready to Bake Refrigerated Batter” by Stanton published Feb. 22, 2007). However, these products are not taught as being useful for the microwave preparation of small quantities of dessert goods but by conventional oven baking preparation.
In contrast, the present bakeable foams in their uncooked or original state are not fluid like batters or plastic like doughs but are rigid i.e., dimensionally stable (albeit deformable) in consistency.
More recently, especially in Europe, prepackaged batters have been available for consumption, including some which are shelf-stable in nature. The most challenging aspect of prehydrated leavened batters is the ability to maintain shelf-life. Various approaches exist for extending shelf life, such as pH and water activity control, oxygen removal, and pasteurization. Because of the challenging nature of shelf-life extension, the final baked texture is not similar to the counterpart prepared from scratch or dry mixes. Most importantly, these prehydrated batters are formulated for conventional oven baking, not for microwave baking.
Surprisingly, the present foams exhibit extended shelf stability without significant foam collapse for over six months (when disposed within suitable moisture resistant packaging) yet nonetheless will expand upon microwave heating to form finished baked goods. In part, the present invention resides in preparing such foams in the form of low moisture formulations that exhibit high viscosities at room temperatures yet lower viscosities at the elevated temperatures achieved during microwave baking and heating that allow for expansion to provide the present desirable expanded finished baked goods. By being bakeable to form set structures upon heating, the foams do not simply collapse upon cooling after completion of the baking step. By being in the form of an expandable foam, the present foams can be free of a leavening system. Being free of a conventional leavening system, allows the present foams to enjoy extended color, flavor and pH stability.